Deadline Day Drama

The transfer window has slammed shut once again and Neil Sherwin goes through the winners and losers from the final day of dealings.

Deadline Day, or #deadlineday as us cool kids over on Twitter call it, was another flurry of car window interviews, Jim Whyte and fax machines as clubs up and down the country battled to strenghten their squads at the last minute. Here’s the best and worst of the action:

Winners:

Arsenal

Arsene Wenger had to do something in wake of the 8-2 defeat to Manchester United and the Arsenal boss has responded with a flurry of late deals. Mikel Arteta is a top quality addition and shouldn’t require a settling in period, and the same can be said for Yossi Benayoun. If both can remain fit, and it is an ‘if’, then the Gunners will have gone a long way to replacing Samir Nasri and Cesc Fabregas. Brazilian left back Andre Santos and German Per Mertesacker will help shore up a leaky defence, while South Korean captain Park Chu-Young will provide a target up front. They’ve also gotten rid of Nicklas Bendtner for the season which can only be a good thing.

Stoke

They needed some options up top and Tony Pulis has gotten the cheque book to bring in both Peter Crouch and Cameron Jerome. Crouch was a spent force at Spurs but will no doubt be the subject of many a long throw in at the Brittania Stadium. Wilson Palacios will add a bit of tenacity to the midfield, not that it’s really needed admittedly.

QPR

Having already signed Joey Barton, QPR made an astute acquisition in his former Manchester City room mate Shaun Wright-Phillips. SWP may no longer be the wing wizard he once was but there is still a place for him in the Premier League. Throw Anton Ferdinand and the previously signed Luke Young and Armand Traore into the defensive mix and there is the bones of a good squad that could stay up.

Tottenham

They stuck to their guns and hung on to Luka Modric while also getting rid of deadwood such as Alan Hutton, Wilson Palacios, Jermaine Jenas and David Bentley. Peter Crouch was also shipped out for a tidy £10 million meaning Daniel Levy has once again proved himself to be a shrewd operator.

Fulham

The Cottagers saw off competition from Newcastle United to bag the signature of FC Twente forward Bryan Ruiz while also adding 23 year old Portuguese international Orlando Sa to their ranks on a three year deal.

Losers:

Everton

Everton fans must loathe the tansfer window at this stage. Once again they have lost key players in the form of Mikel Arteta and Jermaine Beckford. While Beckford hardly set the world alight, it has been a long time since the Toffees had a decent compliment of strikers. The unpronounceable Denis Stracqualursi has come in on loan from Tigres of Argentina but it could take him time to adjust to his new surroundings, and loan signing Royston Drenthe is very much hit and miss.

Newcastle United

Eight months down the road and still no adequate replacement for Andy Carroll.

Author Info

Neil Sherwin

Co-editor of BackPageFootball.com and BackPageRugby.com. Writes mostly on Premier League, A-League and MLS with contributions to other sites including TheFootballSack, InBedWithMaradona and Bloomberg's BSports. Has featured on The Guardian's Football Weekly.

2 Responses

Spurs have done well in terms of pure business transactions, but from a footballing point of view the squad is still 2 or 3 players short of where it needs to be.

I’d say Liverpool could also be considered winners. Signing Bellamy on a free, offloading Joe Cole (& his big wage bill) to Lille, plus getting $12 million for Meireles who Dalglish considers surplus to requirements makes sense.

I’m happy Arsene has pretty much done the business he needed to. I still think possibly we’re a winger short but it’s great to see he’s gone for experience this time and not to forget he also bought in Ryo, Oxtail Soup and Gervinho this summer.

Shame it took a massive whipping by ManU to force his hand to make what appear to be pretty straightforward deals!